Lesson 0.01 • Introduction
Introduction
See also: French language French is a Romance language, descended from Latin and closely related to Portuguese, Spanish, Italian, and Romanian. It is the native tongue of over 87 million people and has an additional 68 million non-native speakers. live version discussion exercises edit lesson comment report an error ask a question

History
Further information: History of the French language In medieval times and until the 19th century, it was often the language used in diplomacy, culture, administration, royal courts across Europe and also in trade, thus appropriately becoming the lingua franca of its time. French-speaking people have made incursions upon the British Isles many times in the past, most noticeably in the Norman Invasion of 1066. For this reason, although English is a Germanic language, at least a third of the English lexicon is derived from French.

Extent of the Language

French is spoken all around the world. Main article: La Francophonie Main article: French colonial empires In modern terms, it is still significantly used as a diplomatic language, being an official language of the United Nations, the Olympic Games, and the European Union. It is the official language of 29 countries and is spoken in France, Belgium, Switzerland, Luxemburg, Tunisia, Morocco, Senegal, Haiti, the Ivory Coast, Madagascar, the Congo, Algeria, Niger, Mali, Burkina Faso, Togo, Gabon, the Seychelles, Burundi, Chad, Rwanda, Djibouti, Cameroon, Mauritius, and Canada (mostly in the province of Québec, where it is the primary language, but it is also used in other parts of the country notably New Brunswick, which is the only bilingual province. All consumer product packages in Canada are required by law to have both English and French labels). Allons-y! Bonne chance! congratulations on completing

Lesson 0.02 • Learning French
Reasons To Learn French
As mentioned earlier, French is significantly used as a diplomatic language. You are bound to find speakers almost everywhere in the world. In addition to societal reasons, there exist dozens of famous French novels and nonfiction works in a variety of subjects. Because much can be lost in translation, the best way to go about reading these works is in the native language. live version discussion exercises edit lesson comment report an error ask a question

Advice on Studying French
Main article: How to learn a language French tends to have a bad reputation amongst English speakers as hard to learn. While it is true that it poses certain difficulties to native English-speakers, it may be noted that English is also considered to be 'difficult', and yet we learnt it without the benefit of already knowing a language. In fact, the French language can be learned in only ten months. Learning any new language requires some commitment, generally long-term. Remember that, like any skill, it requires a certain amount of effort. And if you do not practice your French regularly, it is highly likely that you will begin to forget it. Try to make it a part of your schedule; even if it's not daily, at least make it regular. Remember that you are learning a new skill. Try to master the simple stuff before moving on to the more complex. We all have to add and subtract before we can do calculus. French is a complete language. While this course can teach you to read and write in French, this is only half of the skills that make up fluency. A written document cannot teach much about listening to and speaking French. You must train all of these skills, and they will reinforce one another. For listening and speaking, finding a native speaker to help you once you have some skill will help you with these skills. The very best way to learn French is to get amnesia in France or another French-speaking country. This allows you to start with a clean slate, as babies do. However, most of us are unwilling to take that step. The next best thing is immersion. If you are serious about learning French, a period of immersion (where you go to live in a Francophone culture) is a good idea once you are moderately studied. Most countries are in the relative vicinity of a French-speaking country. If you can't travel to a French-speaking country, then try listening to French-language programs on the radio, TV, or the Internet. Rent or buy French-language movies. Pay attention to pronunciation. Grab a French speaker you meet and talk to him or her in French. Listen, speak, and practice. Read French newspapers and magazines. Again, an excellent source is Google's news page, which links to French-language news stories, which will enrich your vocabulary.

Book Organization
This book is divided into one set of preliminary lessons, the page of which you are reading now, and four increasingly complex lesson levels. The introductory lessons will teach you pronunciation and phrases. In the first level, you will learn basic grammar, including pronouns, the present indicative, most common present tense, and several irregularly-conjugated verbs. In the second level, the passé composé, the most common past tense, is given, along with many other irregular verbs. In the third level, you will learn several more tenses and complex grammar rules. The fourth level (still in development), will be conducted in French and will focus on French literature and prose writing. For more on course structure, and information on how you can help improve this book, see the lessons planning page. congratulations on completing

In addition, French uses several accents which are worth understanding. These are: à, è, ù, (grave accents) and é (acute accent) which only applies to e. A circumflex applies to all vowels as well: â, ê, î, ô, û. And also a tréma (French for diaerasis) for vowels: ä, ë, ï, ö, ü, ÿ and combined letters: æ and œ.

Letters and Examples
French Grammar • Alphabet • audio (info •101 kb • help) The French Alphabet • L'alphabet français name in French letter pronunciation (in IPA transcription) Aa like a in father /a/ Bb like b in baby* /be/ before e and i: like c in center Cc /se/ before a, o, or u: like c in cat Dd like d in dog /de/ Ee approx. like u in burp** /ə/ Ff like f in fog /ɛf/ before e and i: like s in measure Gg /ʒe/ before a, o, or u: like g in get aspirated h: see note below* Hh /aʃ/ non-aspirated h: not pronounced*** Ii like ea in team /i/ Jj like s in measure /ʒi/ Kk like k in kite /ka/ Ll like l in lemon /ɛl/ Mm like m in minute /ɛm/ Nn like n in note /ɛn/ closed: approx. like u in nut Oo /o/ open: like o in nose Pp like p in pen* /pe/ /ky/ see 'u' Qq like k in kite for details force air through the back of your throat Rr /ɛʀ/ just as if you were gargling like s in sister at begining Ss of word or with two s's /ɛs/ or like z in amazing if only one s Tt like t in top /te/ Say the English letter e, Uu /y/ but make your lips say "oo". Vv like v in violin /ve/ Depending on the derivation of the Ww word, /dubləve/ like v as in violin, or w in water either /ks/ in socks, Xx /iks/ or /gz/ in exit Yy like ea in leak /igrək/

Zz

like z in zebra

/zɛd/

Final consonants and the liaison
In French, certain consonants are silent when they are the final letter of a word. The letters p (as in 'coup'), s (as in 'héros'), t (as in 'chat'), d (as in 'marchand), and x (as in 'paresseux'), are never pronounced at the end of a word.

b and p
Unlike English, when you pronounce the letters 'b' and 'p' in French, little to no air should be expended from your mouth. In terms of phonetics, the difference in the French 'b' and 'p' and their English counterparts is one of aspiration (this is not related to the similarly named concept of 'h' aspiré below, but is a slight extra puff of air accompanies the stop). Fortunately, in English both aspirated and unaspirated variants (allophones) actually exist, but only in specific environments. If you're a native speaker, say the word 'pit' and then the word 'spit' out loud. Did you notice the extra puff of air in the first word that doesn't come with the second? The 'p' in 'pit' is aspirated [pʰ]; the 'p' in 'spit' is not (like the 'p' in any position in French).

Exercise
1. Get a loose piece of printer paper or notebook paper. 2. Hold the piece of paper about one inch (or a couple of centimeters) in front of your face. 3. Say the words baby, and puppy like you normally would in English. Notice how the paper moved when you said the 'b' and the 'p' respectively. 4. Now, without making the piece of paper move, say the words belle (the feminine form of beautiful in French, pronounced like the English 'bell.'), and papa, (the French equivalent of "Dad").
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If the paper moved, your pronunciation is slightly off. Concentrate, and try it again. If the paper didn't move, congratulations! You pronounced the words correctly!

Aspirated vs. non-aspirated h
In French, the letter h can be aspirated, (h aspiré), or not aspirated, (h non aspiré), depending on which language the word was borrowed from. What do these terms mean?
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Ex.: the word héros, (hero) has an aspirated h, because when the definite article le is placed before it, the result is le héros, and both words must be pronounced separately. However, the feminine form of héros, héroïne is a non-aspirated h. Therefore, when you put the definite artcle in front of it, it becomes l'héroïne, and is pronounced as one word.

The only way to tell if the h at the beginning of a word is aspirated is to look it up in the dictionary. Some dictionaries will place an asterisk (*) in front of the entry word in the French-English H section if the h is aspirated. Other dictionaries will include it in the pronunciation guide after the key word by placing a (') before the pronunciation. In short, the words must be memorized.

Exercise
1. Grab an English-French-English dictionary, and find at least ten aspirated h words, and ten nonaspirated h words 2. Make a column of the two categories of h-word. 3. Look at it every day and memorize the columns.

Note : As of the spelling reform of 1990, the diaresis indicating gu is not a digraph on words finishing in guë is now placed on the u in standard (AKA "académie française" French) : aigüe and not aiguë, cigüe and not ciguë, ambigüe and not ambiguë (acute(fem), conium, ambiguous). Since this reform is relatively recent and not known in vulgar surrounding, both spellings can be used interchangeably (you might even get a point knocked off if you write "aigüe" in a text, it happened to me!) Note : The letter ÿ is only used in very rare words, most old town names : L'Haÿ-Les-Roses (Paris surburb). Pronounced like ï.

Acute Accent - Accent aigu
The acute accent (French, accent aigu) is the most common accent used in written French. It is only used with the letter e and is always pronounced /ay/. One use of the accent aigu is to form the past participle of regular -er verbs. infinitive aimer, to love past participle aimé, loved

regarder, to watch regardé, watched

Another thing to note is if you are unsure of how to translate certain words into English from French, and the word begins with é, replace that with the letter s and you will occasionally get the English word, or an approximation thereof:
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Unlike à and ù, è is not used to distinguish words from one another. The è used for pronunciation. In careful speech, an unaccented e is pronounced /euh/, and in rapid speech is sometimes not pronounced at all. The è is pronounced like the letter e in pet.

Speech: Tonic Accent - L’accent tonique
In English, you stress certain syllables more than others. However in French, you pronounce each syllable evenly. congratulations on completing

Formal Lesson - Greetings
When talking to one's peers or to children, Salut! is used as a greeting. It's English equivalents would be hi and hey. Bonjour, literally meaning good day, should be used for anyone else. Bonsoir. is used to say Good evening. Bonne nuit. is used to say Good night. before going to bed.

Formal Lesson - Good-byes
In addition to being used as an informal greeting, Salut. also means bye. Again, it should only be used among friends. Another informal greeting is ciao, an Italian word commonly used in France. Au revoir is the only formal way to say Good-bye. If you will be meeting someone again soon, À bientôt. or À tout à l'heure. is used. À demain. is used if you will be seeing the person the following day.

V: Names
Tu t'appelles comment ? is used to informally ask someone for his or her name. You respond to this with Je m'appelle [name]. In the next lesson, you will learn more formal ways of asking someone for their name. Check for understanding
One of your good friends is introducing you to his younger cousin who is visiting on a trip from France, and doesn't speak a word of English. You want to introduce yourself to him, tell him your name, and ask "What's up?"

G: Vous vs. tu
This is an important difference between French and English. English doesn't have a singular and plural, formal version of "you" (although "thou" used to be the informal (arguably archaic) singular version in the days of Shakespeare). In French, it is important to know when to use "vous" and when to use "tu". "Vous" is a plural form of "you". This is somewhat equivalent to "y'all", "youse", "you guys", "all of you", except that it is much more formal than all but the last example. "Vous" is also used to refer to single individuals to show respect, to be polite or to be neutral. It is used in occasions when talking to someone who is important, someone who is older than you are, or someone you are unfamiliar with. This is known as w:Vouvoiement. Note the conversation between M. Bernard and M. Lambert above as an example of this use. Conversely, "tu" is the singular and informal form of "vous" (you) in French. It is commonly used when referring to a friend and a family member, and also used between children or when addressing a child. If it is used when speaking to a stranger, it signals disrespect. This is known as w:Tutoiement. As a rule of thumb, use "tu" only when you would call that person by his first name, otherwise use "vous". French people will make it known when they would like you to refer to them by "tu".

Formal Lesson - Titles
The titles monsieur, madame, and mademoiselle are almost always used alone, without the last name of the person. When beginning to speak to a professor, employer, or generally someone older than you, it is polite to say monsieur, madame, or mademoiselle.

Formal Lesson - Asking How One Is Doing
Ça va? is used to ask someone how they are doing. The phrase literally means It goes?, referring to the body and life. A more formal way to say this is Comment allez-vous?. You can respond by using ça va as a statement; Ça va. roughly means I'm fine. The adverb bien is used to say well, and is often said both alone and as Ça va bien. Bien is preceded by certain adverbs to specify the degree to which you are well. Common phrases are assez bien, meaning rather well, très bien, meaning very well, and vraiment bien, meaning really well. The adverb mal is used to say badly. Pas is commonly added to mal to form Pas mal., meaning Not bad. Comme-ci, comme-ça., literally translating to Like this, like that., is used to say So, so. To be polite, add merci, meaning thank you to responses to questions. Check for understanding
Pretend to have (or actually have) a verbal conversation with various people that you know, such as siblings, friends, children, teachers, coworkers, or heads of state. Address them in different ways, depending on their relation to you. Ask them how they are doing, and finally say goodbye.

For 70-79, it builds upon "soixante" but past that it builds upon a combination of terms for 8099 Only the first (21,31,41,51,etc) have "et un"; but past this it is simply both words consecutively (vingt-six, trente-trois, etc) For 100-199, it looks much like this list already save that "cent" is added before the rest of the number; this continues up to 1000 and onward. Many speakers of French outside of France refer to the numbers 70 to 99 in the same pattern as the other numbers. For instance, in Switzerland and Belgium, seventy is "septante," 71 is "septante et un," 72 "septante deux," and so on. Ninety is "nonante". In Switzerland, Eighty is "huitante" or "octante".

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What day is it today? is equivalent to Quel jour sommes-nous ?. Quel jour sommes-nous ? can be answered with Nous sommes..., C'est... or On est... (last two are less formal). Nous sommes... is not used with hier, aujourd’hui, or demain. C'était (past) or C'est (present/future) must be used accordingly. The days of the week are not capitalized in French.

V: Time
In French, “il est” is used to express the time; though it would literally translate as “he is”, it is actually, in this case, equivalent to “it is” (impersonal "il"). Unlike in English, it is always important to use “heures” (“hours”) when referring to the time. In English, it is OK to say, “It’s nine,” but this wouldn’t make sense in French. French Vocabulary • Time • audio (info •145 kb • help) Time • Le temps Quelle heure est-il ? What time is it? Il est une heure. It is one o’clock. Il est trois heures. It is three o’clock. Il est dix heures. It is ten o’clock. Il est midi. It is noon. Il est minuit. It is midnight. Il est quatre heures cinq. It is five past four. Il est quatre heures et quart. It is a quarter past four. Il est quatre heures moins le It is a quarter till 4. quart Il est quatre heures quinze. It is four fifteen. Il est quatre heures et demie. It is half past four. Il est quatre heures trente. It is four thirty. Il est cinq heures moins vingt. It is twenty to five. Il est quatre heures quarante. It is four forty.

V: Times of Day
French Vocabulary • Time • audio (info •618 kb •
help)

In addition, French uses several accents which are worth understanding. These are: à, è, ù, (grave accents) and é (acute accent) which only applies to e. A circumflex applies to all vowels as well: â, ê, î, ô, û. And also a tréma (French for diaerasis) for vowels: ä, ë, ï, ö, ü, ÿ and combined letters: æ and œ

For 70-79, it builds upon "soixante" but past that it builds upon a combination of terms for 8099 Only the first (21,31,41,51,etc) have "et un"; but past this it is simply both words consecutivly (vingt-six, trente-trois, etc) For 100-199, it looks much like this list already save that "cent" is added before the rest of the number; this continues up to 1000 and onward.

V: Time
In French, “il est” is used to express the time; though it would literally translate as “he is”, it is actually, in this case, equivalent to “it is” (unpersonal "il"). Unlike in English, it is always important to use “heures” (“hours”) when referring to the time. In English, it is OK to say, “It’s nine,” but this wouldn’t make sense in French. French Vocabulary • Review • audio (info •145 kb • help) Time • Le temps Quelle heure est-il ? What time is it? Il est une heure. It is one o’clock. Il est trois heures. It is three o’clock. Il est dix heures. It is ten o’clock. Il est midi. It is noon. Il est minuit. It is midnight. Il est quatre heures cinq. It is five past four. Il est quatre heures et quart. It is a quarter past four. Il est quatre heures quinze. It is four fifteen. Il est quatre heures et demie. It is half past four. Il est quatre heures trente. It is four thirty. Il est cinq heures moins vingt. It is twenty to five. Il est quatre heures quarante. It is four forty.

What day is it today? is equivalent to Quel jour sommes-nous ?. Quel jour sommes-nous ? can be answered with Nous sommes..., C'est... or On est... (last two are less formal). Nous sommes... is not used with hier, aujourd’hui, or demain. C'était (past) or C'est (present/future) must be used accordingly.

Bien is an adverb meaning well. Its adjective equivalent is bon(ne), which means good. Since je vais, meaning I go, uses an action verb, the adjective bien is used. In English, I'm good, which uses the linking verb am, is followed by an adjective rather than an adverb. 2 Est-ce que... literally means Is is that... and is often used to start questions. This is used in a similar manner to do in English. Instead of You want it?, one can say Do you want it? Est-ce que... has no real meaning, other than signifying that a question follows. 3 chez... is a preposition meaning at the house of.... Chez moi is used to say at my place. Chez [name] is used to say at [name's] place. 4 on can mean we or one.

French Level One Lessons Allons! - Basic French
If you haven't done so already, spend a few minutes to first read the course's introductory lessons. Once that's done, you're ready to begin your very first traditional French lesson! After you have completed this level, you can move on to the next level. Finally, go to the lessons planning page if you would like to help improve this course.

Lesson 1.01 • Basic grammar
G: Gender of Nouns
In French, all nouns have a grammatical gender, that is, they are masculine or feminine for the purposes of grammar only. Most nouns that express entities with gender (people and animals) use both a feminine form and a masculine form, for example, the two words for "actor" in French are acteur (m) and actrice (f). The nouns that express entities without gender (e.g., objects and abstract concepts) have only one form. This form can be masculine or feminine. For example, la voiture (the car) can only be feminine; le stylo (the pen) can only be masculine. There are some nouns that express entities with gender for which there is only one form, which is used regardless of the actual gender of the entity, for example, the word for person; personne; is always feminine, even if the person is male, and the word for teacher; professeur; is always masculine even if the teacher is female[1]. live version discussion exercises edit lesson comment report an error ask a question

Examples French Grammar • Basic grammar • audio (info •113 kb • help) Gender of Nouns • Genre des Noms Common Endings Used Masculine With Masculine Nouns: le fromage le cheval[2] the horse -age the cheese le professeur[1] le chien the dog -r the teacher le chat le livre the book -t the cat le capitalisme le bruit the noise -isme capitalism Common Endings Used Feminine With Feminine Nouns: la boulangerie la colombe the dove -ie the bakery la nation la chemise the shirt -ion the nation la fraternité la maison the house -ite/-ité brotherhood la balance la liberté liberty -nce the scales la fille -nne the girl -mme l’indienne -lle the Indian 1. Professeur can be shortened to prof. While the long form, professeur, is always masculine, even when referring to female teachers, prof can be either masculine or feminine. (le prof - the (male) teacher) (la prof - the (female) teacher) '2. In this book, the definate article will come before a noun in vocabulary charts. If the definate article is l due to elision, (m) will follow a noun to denote a masculine gender and (f) will follow a noun to denote a feminine gender. Unfortunately, there are many exceptions in French which can only be learned. There are even words that are spelled the same, but have a different meaning when masculine or feminine; for example, un livre (m) means a book, but une livre (f) means a pound! Some words that appear to be masculine (like la photo, which is actually short for la photographie) are in fact feminine, and vice versa. Then there are some that just don't make sense; la foi is feminine and means a belief, whereas le foie means liver. To help overcome this hurdle which many beginners find very difficult, be sure to learn the genders along with the words.

G: Definite and Indefinite Articles
The Definite Article
In English, the definite article is always “the”. Unlike English, the definite article is used to talk about something in a general sense, a general statement or feeling about an idea or thing. In French, the definite article is changed depending on the noun's: 1. Gender 2. Plurality 3. First letter of the word There are three definite articles and an abbreviation. "Le" is used for masculine nouns, "La" is used for feminine nouns, "Les" is used for plural nouns (both masculine or feminine), and "L' " is used when the noun begins with a vowel or silent "h" (both masculine or feminine). It is similar to english, where "a" changes to "an" before a vowel. French Grammar • Basic grammar • audio (info •78 kb • help) The Definite Article • L'article défini feminine la la fille the daughter singular [3] masculine le le fils the son singular, starting with a vowel l’ l’enfant the child sound les filles the daughters plural les les fils the sons les enfants the children

Plurality, Pronunciation, and Exceptions
The plural of most nouns is formed by adding an -s. However, the -s ending is not pronounced. It is the article that tells the listener whether the noun is singular or plural. 3. Fils: Most singular nouns do not end in -s. The -s is added for the plural form of the noun. Fils is one exception. Whenever the singular form of a noun ends in -s, there is no change in the plural form. le fils les fils un fils des fils the son the sons a son (some) sons le cours les cours un cours des cours the course the courses a course (some) courses Secondly, the final consonant is almost always not pronounced unless followed by an -e (or another vowel). Fils (pronounced feece) is also an exception to this rule.

Elision
The definite articles le and la are shortened to l’ when they come before a noun that begins with a vowel. When pronounced, the vowel sound is dropped.
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The Indefinite Article
In English, the indefinite articles are "a" and "an". "Some" is used as a plural article in English. Again, indefinite articles in French take different forms depending on gender and plurality. The articles "Un" and "une" literally mean "one" in French. French Grammar • Basic grammar • audio (info •55 kb • help) The Indefinite Article • L'article indéfini feminine une oon une fille a daughter singular masculine un uh un fils a son des filles some daughters plural des day des fils1 some sons
1"des

fils" does mean "some sons" but is an homograph: it can also mean "some threads" (when pronounced like "fill")

Liaison
Remember that the last consonant of a word is typically not pronounced unless followed by a vowel. Well when a word ending in a consonant is followed by a word beginning with a vowel sound, the consonant often becomes pronounced. This is a process called liaison. When a vowel goes directly after un, the normally unpronounced n sound becomes pronounced.
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In this book, you will see liaison denoted with n or z between two words.

"Some"
Note that des, like les is used in French before plural nouns when no article is used in English. Let's imagine you are looking at photographs in an album. In English, we would say "I am looking at photographs." In French, you cannot say, "Je regarde photographies," you must tell which photographs you are looking at using an article. If you were looking at a set of specific pictures, you would say "Je regarde les photographies." ("I am looking at the photographs.") If you were just flipping through the album, looking at nothing in particular, you would say, "Je regarde des photographies." ("I am looking at some photographs.")

V: Expressions
Qu’est-ce que c’est?
To say What is it? or What is that? in French, Qu’est-ce que c’est? (pronounced kehss keuh say) is used.
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Qu’est-ce que c’est? - What is it?

Literally, Qu’est-ce que c’est? translates to What is it that it is? You will be using Qu'est-ce que...? often to say What...? at the beginning of sentences. To respond to this question, you say C’est un(e) [nom]., meaning It is a [noun].
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Remember that the indefinate article (un or une) must agree with the noun it modifies.
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Il y a...
Il y a (pronounced eel ee ah) is used to say there is (or there's) and there are.
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Il y a une pomme. - There is an apple.

The phrase is used for both singular and plural nouns. Unlike in English (is => are), il y a does not change form.
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Il y a des pommes. - There are (some) apples.

The -s at the end of the most plural of most nouns tells you that the phrase is there are instead of there is. In spoken French, when both the singular and plural forms almost always sound the same, the article (and perhaps other adjectives modifying the noun) is used to distinguish between singular and plural versions. You will soon learn that a is the present third person singular form of avoir, the verb meaing to have, and that y is a pronoun meaning there. The phrase il y a, then, literally translates to he has there. You will see this phrase used in all French tenses. It is important to remember that verb stays as a form of be and not have. Like in English, il y a... is not often used to point out an object in front of you. To say that, voici and voilà are used.

Voici et Voilà
Voici... translates to here is... and here are. Similarly, voilà means there is and there are. They are used to point out objects in front of you or in exclamatory sentences. congratulations on completing

When referring to more than one person in the 2nd person, “vous” must be used. When referring to a single person, “vous” or “tu” may be used depending on the situation; see notes in the introductory lessons. The pronoun it does not exist in French. Il replaces all masculine nouns, even those that are not human. The same is true with elle and feminine nouns. In addition to the nuances between vous and tu, as discussed earlier, French pronouns carry meanings that do not exist in English pronouns. The French third person "on" has several meanings, but most closely matches the now archaic English "one". While in English, "One must be very careful in French grammar" sounds old-fashioned, the French equivalent "On doit faire très attention à la grammaire française" is quite acceptable. Also, while the third person plural "they" has no gender in English, the French equivalents "ils" and "elles" do. However, when pronounced, they normally sound the same as "il" and "elle", so distinguishing the difference requires understanding of the various conjugations of the verbs following the pronoun. Also, if a group of people consists of both males and females, the male form is used, even if there is only one male in a group of thousands of females. In everyday language, “on” is used, instead of “nous”, to express “we”; the verb is always used in the 3rd person singular. For example, to say "We (are) meeting at 7 o'clock", you could say either “On se rencontre au cinéma à sept heures.” (colloquial) or “Nous nous rencontrons au cinéma à sept heures.” (formal). For more, see the Wikipedia entry.

G: Introduction to Verbs
A verb is a word that describes an action or mental or physical state.

Tenses and Moods
French verbs can be formed in four moods, each of which express a unique feeling. Each mood has a varying number of tenses, which indicate the time when an action takes place. In the next section, we will look at the conjugations in the present tense of the indicative mood, more commonly called the present indicative. There is one conjugation for each of the six subject pronouns.

Infinitives
In this book, the infinitive form of the verb will be used to identify it. In English, the infinitive form is to ___. In French, the infinitive is one word. For example, parler translates to to speak, finir translates to to finish, and aller translates to to go.

Conjugation
French verbs conjugate, which means they take different shapes depending on the subject. English verbs only have one conjugation; that is the third person singular (I see, you see, he/she sees, we see, they see). The only exception is the verb "to be" (I am; (thou art); you are; he/she is; we are; they are;). Most French verbs will conjugate into many different forms. Most verbs are regular, which means that they conjugate in the same way. The most common verbs, however, are irregular.

G: Être - To Be
Être translates as to be in English. It is an irregular verb, and is not conjugated like any other verb.

Formation
French Verb • To be • audio (info •103 kb • help) être • to be Singular Plural first person je suis jeuh swee I am nous sommes noo sum we are second person tu es too ay you are vous êtes voozett you are il est eel ay he is they are ils sont eelsohn (masc. or mized) third person elle est ell ay she is on est ohn ay one is elles sont ellsohn they are (fem.)

Expressing Agreement
Tu es d’accord ou pas?, Tu es d’accord? (lit: You are of agreement?), or simply D'accord? is used informally to ask whether someone agrees with you. To respond poitevely, you say Oui, je suis d'accord. or simply D'accord. In English, one would say Okay. when D'accord. is used in French.

G: Cities and Nationalities
To say what city you are from, you use the preposition de.
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Il est de Paris.

When stating your nationality or job, it is not necessary to include the article. This is an exception to the normal rule.
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Je suis Australien(ne). - I am Australian.

There is both a masculine and feminine form of saying your nationality - for males and females respectively.
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Il est Australien. - He is Australian. Elle est Australienne. - She is Australian. Check for understanding
Please use the the nationalities list to find out what your nationality is in French. Then say what city you are from and what nationality you are. Then say what nationality some of your friends are, and what city they are from. For example, Marie est italienne. Elle est de Rome.

In the next lesson, you will learn how to say the nationality of more than one person.

Lesson 1.03 • Description
G: Adjectives - Les adjectifs
Main article: French/Grammar/Adjectives Just like articles, French adjectives also have to match the nouns that they modify in gender and plurality. live version discussion exercises edit lesson comment report an error ask a question

Regular Formation
Most adjective changes occur in the following manner:
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With plural adjectives, the -s ending is not pronounced, so the adjective will sound exactly the same as the singular form.

Exceptions and Irregularities
Adjectives that end in e in the masculine form do not change in gender. When an adjective, such as gros, ends in -s, it does not change in the masculine plural form. Sometimes the final consonant is doubled in the feminine form. See French/Grammar/Adjectives for more.

^ Often when a vowel sound comes after a consonant, the usually unpronounced s and z change to a sharp z sound and link to the next syllable. This process is called liaison. In this book, will will show that the sound is connected usung z. Trèszin is pronounced trayzahn. congratulations on finishing

Lesson 1.04 • Family
G: The verb avoir
"Avoir" can be translated as "to have". live version discussion exercises edit lesson comment report an error ask a question

Formation

French Verb • Present Indicative • audio (100 kb • help) avoir • to have Singular Plural first person j'ai zjay I have nouszavons noozahvohn we have second person tu as too ah you have il a eel ah he has third person elle a ell ah she has onna ohnah one has vouszavez voozahvay you have ilszont eelzohnt they have (masc. or mized) they have (fem.)

elleszont ellzohnt

Examples
J'ai deux stylos. Tu as trois frères. Il a une idée. I have two pens. You have three brothers. He has an idea.

Expressing Age
Avoir is used to express age.
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Tu as quel âge? - How old are you? [lit: You have what age?] J'ai trente ans. - I'm thirty (years old). [lit: I have thirty years]

There is/are - Il y a
The expression il y a means there is or there are.
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Il y a un livre. - There is a book. Il y a des livres. - There are books.

G: Direct Object Pronouns le, la, and les
le, la, and les are called direct object pronouns, because they are pronouns that are, you guessed it, used as direct objects. A direct object is a noun that is acted upon by a verb.
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Il jette la boule. - He throws the ball.

In the above sentence la boule is the direct object. You have learned earlier that names and regular nouns can be replaced by the subject pronouns (je, tu...). Similary, direct objects, such as "la boule", can be replaced by pronouns.
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Lesson 1.05 • Recreation
G: Regular -er Verbs
Formation
Most French verbs fall into the category of -er verbs. To conjugate, drop the -er to find the "stem" or "root". Add endings to the root based on the subject and tense. live version discussion exercises edit lesson comment report an error ask a question

Elision and Liaison
In all conjugations, je changes to j ' when followed by a vowel. Example: J'attends. Also, as a rule of thumb: h is considered a vowel; as in J'habite.... If a phrase is negative, ne changes to n'. In all plural forms, the s at the end of each subject pronoun, normally unpronounced, becomes a z sound and the n of on becomes pronounced when followed by a vowel.

S'amuser
Main article: French/Grammar/Verbs/Pronominal The verb s'amuser means to have fun in English. It is a type of pronominal verb (a verb that includes a pronoun as part of it) called a reflexive verb, which means that the action of the verb is reflected back onto the subject. Literally translated, the verb means I amuse myself. Formation

Conjugated Verb + Infinitive
Like in English, some verbs can be followed by infinitives. The most common -er verbs used in this manner are aimer and détester.
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When negating a sentence, remember that the negative goes around the conjugated verb.
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D: Recreation
Here is a short dialog about people planning/doing leisure activities. Besides the new vocabulary you should also have a look at how the verbs are conjugated depending on the subject of the sentence.
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V: Recreation
Qu'est-ce que vous faîtes? What are you doing? jouer to play finir[1] to finish attendre[1] to wait (for) aimer to like détester to hate rigoler to joke around[2] (mon/ma) ami(e) (my) friend ^ Finir and attendre are not regular -er verbs. You will learn their conjuagtion in a later lesson. ^ Tu rigoles! means You’re joking! or You don’t mean it!

Whether lui means to him or to her is given by context. In English, "He throws him the ball" is also said, and means the same thing. When used with the direct object pronouns le, la, and les, lui and leur come after those pronouns.
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Il la lui jette. - He throws it to him.

Note that while le, la, and les are used to replace people or inanimate objects, lui and leur are not used to replace innanimate objects and things. Also note that unlike le and la, which are shortened to l' when followed by a vowel, lui is never shortened

V: Jouer
The verb jouer is a regular -er verb meaning to play. It can be used to refer to both sports and instruments. When referring to sports, use jouer à, but when referring to instruments, use jouer de... As always, jouer must be conjugated rather than left in the infinitive. French Vocabulary • Recreation Play • Jouer jouer à... jouer de... baseball de la clarinette clarinet basketball du piano piano soccer; football de la guitare guitar American football du violon violin

J'habite Rue Lecourbe. - I live on Lecourbe Street. Il habite Rue de Rennes. - He lives on Rennes Street.

^ Quitter must be followed by a direct object, usually a room or building.. Partir is used in other phrases. You will learn how to conjugate these verbs in a future lesson.

G: Faire
The verb faire is translated to to do or to make. It is irregularly conjugated (it does not count as a regular -re verb).

Formation

French Verb • Present Indicative • audio (432 kb • help) faire • to do, to make Singular Plural first person je fais jzeuh fay I do nous faisons noo fezohn we do second person tu fais too fay il fait eel fay third person elle fait ell fay on fait oh fay you do vous faites voo feht he does ils font eel fohnt she does one does elles font ell fohnt you do they do (masc. or mized) they do (fem.)

V: Housework
French Vocabulary • The house • audio (info •524 kb • help) Housework • Le ménage faire la cuisine to do the cooking faire la lessive/le linge to do the laundry faire le jardin to do the gardening faire le lit to make the bed faire le ménage to do the housework faire la vaiselle to do the dishes faire les carreaux to do the windows faire les courses to do the shopping/errands faire le repassage to do the ironing

These pronouns are placed before the verb that they modify • Je te vois. - I see you. • Je veux te voir. - I want to see you. If a perfect tense is used, these pronouns go before the auxillary verb. • Je t'ai vu. - I saw you.

Lesson 1.07 • Weather
G: Standard Negation
In order to say that one did not do something, the ne ... pas construction must be used. The ne is placed before the verb, while the pas is placed after. live version discussion exercises edit lesson comment report an error ask a question

Formation and Rules
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Simple negation is done by wrapping ne...pas around the verb. • Je ne vole pas. - I do not steal. In a perfect tense, ne...pas wraps around the auxillary verb, not the participle. • Je n'ai pas volé. - I have not stolen. When an infinitive and conjugated verb are together, ne...pas usually wraps around the conjugated verb. • Je ne veux pas voler. - I do not want to steal. ne pas can also go directly in front of the infinitive for a different meaning. • Je veux ne pas voler. - I want to not steal. ne goes before any pronoun relating to the verb it affects. • Je ne le vole pas. - I did not steal it.

J'ai un livre. - I have a book. Je n'ai pas de livre. - I don't have any book. J'ai des livres. - I have some books. Je n'ai pas de livres. - I don't have any books.

Examples
Il est belge.. Il n'est pas belge. Nous lisons un livre. Nous ne lisons pas de livre. Je mange une cerise. Je ne mange pas de cerise. He is Belgian. He is not Belgian. We read a book. We do not read a book. I eat a cherry. I do not eat a cherry.

Usage
There is no present progressive tense in French, so aller in the present indicative is used to express both I go and I am going. Aller must be used with a place and cannot stand alone. The preposition à, meaing in, at, or to, is used, followed by the place.
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Instead of a preposition and place, you can use the pronoun y, meaning there. Y comes before the verb. Remember that aller must be used with a place (there or a name) when indicating that you are going somewhere, even if a place wouldn't normally be given in English.
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Liaison
Usually, whenever a vowel sound comes after ...ons or ...ez, the usually unpronounced s and z change to a sharp z sound and link to the next syllable. (This process is called liaison.) However, since allons and allez begins with vowels, nous allons is pronounced nyoozahloh and vous allez is pronounced voozahlay. In order to have a pleasing and clean sound, two liaisons should not go connsecultively. There is therefore no liaison in allons à when it comes right after nous and allez à when it comes after vous.
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Usage
As you can probably tell from their name, possessive adjective are used to express possession of an object.
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C'est mon livre. - It's my book.

In English the possessive adjective agrees with the subject (his sister, her brother). But in French, possessive adjectives act like all other adjectives: they must agree with the noun they modify. French Grammar • Travel Possesive Adjective Usage • Utilisation des adjectifs possesive Masculine Noun Feminine Noun le livre la voiture le livre de Marc son livre la voiture de Marc sa voiture the book of Marc his book the car of Marc his car les livres de Marc ses livres les voitures de Marc ses voitures the books of Marc his books the cars of Marc his cars le livre de Marie son livre la voiture de Marie sa voiture the book of Marie her book the car of Marie her car les livres de Marie ses livres les voitures de Marie ses voitures the books of Marie her books the cars of Marie her cars Whether the third person singular possessive adjectives son, sa and ses are his or her is indicated by context.
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Elle lit son livre. - She reads her book.

Liaison and Adjective Changes
Liaison occurs when mon, ton, and son are followed by a vowel.
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Lesson 1.09 • Art
live version discussion G: Regular -re Verbs exercises The third category of regular verbs is made up of -re' verbs. To conjugate, drop the edit lesson -re to find the "stem" or "root". Add endings to the root based on the subject and comment tense, as demonstrated below for the present tense. report an error ask a question

French Level Two Lessons Toujours Là? - Slightly More Advanced French
Now that you know how to compose French sentences in the present indicative, you can continue on to Wikibook's second French course. Inside, you will learn the passé composé, the most common French past tense, and review the grammar you have already learned. The grammar now becomes a lot more advanced, and each lesson now gives much more information. After you have completed this level, you can move on to the next level. Also remember to go to the lessons planning page if you would like to help improve this course.

Lesson 2.01 • School
live version discussion G: Introduction to Perfect Tenses exercises The next section is optional. You will eventually learn everything that is covered in edit lesson it, but if you would like a preview, read it, and if not, continue on to the school comment section. report an error ask a question Main article: French/Grammar/Tenses/Composed
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The perfect tenses are also called the compound or composed tenses. The perfect tenses are all composed of a conjugated auxillary verb and a fixed past participle.

Auxillary Verb Formation
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The auxillary verb is always either avoir or être. The tense of the verb depends upon the tense that avoir or être is conjugated in. • When the auxillary verb is conjugated in the passé composé, for example, the auxillary verb is conjugated in the present indicative. • J'ai fini. - I have finished.

The past pasticiple must agree with the direct object of a clause in gender and plurality if the direct object goes before the verb. • the direct object is masculine singular - no change • J'ai fini le jeu. - I have finished the game. • Je l'ai fini. - I have finished it. • the direct object is feminine singular - add an e to the past participle • J'ai fini la tâche. - I have finished the task. • Je l'ai finie. - I have finished it. • the direct object is masculine plural - add an s to the past participle. • J'ai fini les jeux. - I have finished the games. • Je les ai finis. - I have finished them. • the direct object is feminine plural - add an es to the past participle. • J'ai fini les tâches. - I have finished the tasks. • Je l'ai finies. - I have finished them.

Avoir ou Être?
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In most circumstances, the auxillary verb is avoir. However, under certain situations, the auxillary verb is être. This occurs when: • The verb is one of 16 special verbs that take être. • Note that when a direct object is used with these verbs, the auxillary verb becomes avoir. • The verb is reflexive. • That is, the subject of the verb is also its object.

Don't worry if you don't completely understand the perfect tenses. Each tense and lists of irregular verb conjuagtions will be given later in this course. In the next lesson, the passé composé is introduced.

Des fournitures scolaires - School Supllies la craie chalk cray le papier paper la feuille de pahpeeyay le tableau the board tahbloh sheet of paper papier le stylo(pen steeloh (bee) le bloc-notes (small) notepad block nut bille) le classeur three-ring binder le crayon pencil krayoh le sac à dos backpack sack ah doe la calculatrice calculator la gomme eraser gum le livre book leevr le bouquin le règle ruler rehgluh le cahier notebook kie ay le feutre marker feuhtr ^ The word professeur is considered masculine at all times, even if the teacher is female. The only case when "professeur" can be preceded by feminine determinant is either when contracting it in colloquial language "la prof", or when adding a few words before : "madame/mademoiselle la/le professeur". ^ The way that grades are numbered in France is opposite the way they are in the US. Whereas American grade numbers go up as you approach your senior year, they descend in France. ^ Écrire is an irregular verb. You will learn to conjugate it in the next section. ^ In French, you do not "own" body parts. While in English, you would say my hand or your hand, the definate article is always used in French.
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la main - my hand la jambe - my leg le bras - my arm

^ To and of are built into the verbs écouter and entendre respectively. It is not necessary to add a preposition to the verb. Other verbs, such as répondre {à), meaning to respond (to), are almost always followed by a preposition.

G: Passé Composé with Regular Verbs
Main article: French/Grammar/Tenses/Present perfect The passé composé is a perfect tense, and is therefore composed of an auxiliary verb and a past participle. With most verbs, that auxililary verb is avoir.

Meaning
In English, verbs comjugated in the passé composé literally mean have/has ____ed. While there is a simple past tense in French, it is only used in formal writing, so verbs conjugated in the passé composé can also be used to mean the English simple tense.
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For example, the passé composé form of parler (to speak), [avoir] parlé, literally mean has/have spoken, but also means spoke.

Basic Formation
To conjugate a verb in the passé composé, the helping verb, usually avoir, is conjugated in the present indicative and the past participle is then added. Auxiliary Verb - Avoir Conjugate avoir in the present indicative. j'ai I have nous avons we have tu as you have vous avez you have il a he has ils ont they have Past Participle
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Lesson 2.02 • Culture
This lesson is on the culture of France. The culture of France is diverse, reflecting live version regional differences as well as the influence of recent immigration. Also, try and discussion reflect on how your culture is similar and different to French culture. exercises edit lesson comment G: General Verbs Review report an error Most verbs in French are regular -er verbs. Others are regular -ir or -re verbs or are ask a question simply irregular.

1. French butchers do not sell pork, pork products, nor horsemeat. For these products, go to a charcuterie. 2. In France, bakeries only sell fresh bread; e.g. the bread is baked on site. Places where they sell bread that is not fresh are called dépôt de pain. 3. 'Charcuteries' sell things besides pork products, including pâte, salami, cold meats, salads, quiches and pizzas. 4. An alternative to an 'épicerie' is an alimentation générale (a general foodstore).

G: Object Pronouns Review
Direct Objects
While the subject of a sentence initiates an action (the verb), the direct object is the one that is affected by the action. A direct object pronoun is used to refer to the direct object of a previous sentence: Pierre vois le cambrioleur. Pierre sees the burglar. Pierre le vois. Pierre sees him. The following table shows the various types of direct object pronouns: French me, m' te, t' le, l' him, English me1 you1 it Notes:
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la, l' nous vous les her, it us1 you1 them

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me, te, nous, and vous are also used as indirect objects to mean to me, to you, to us, and to you respectively. The pronoun form with an apostrophe is used before a vowel. The direct object pronoun for nous and vous is the same as the subject. When the direct object comes before a verb in a perfect tense, a tense that uses a past participle, the direct object must agree in gender and plurality with the past participle. For example, in te phrase Je les ai eus, or I had them, the past participle would be spelled eus if the direct object, les, was referring to a masculine object, and eues if les is referring to a feminine object.

Indirect Objects
An indirect object is an object that would be asked for with To whom...? or From whom...?. It is called indirect because it occurs usually together with a direct object which is affected directly by the action: Il donne du pain à The man gives some bread to Pierre. Pierre. Il lui donne du pain. He gives bread to him. The following table shows the various types of direct object pronouns: lui to him, to English to me1 to you1 her Notes: French me, m' te, t' nous vous leur

to us1 to you1 to them

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me, te, nous, and vous are also used as direct objects to mean me, you, us, and you respectively. The pronoun form with an apostrophe is used before a vowel. The direct object pronoun for nous and vous is the same as the subject. The indirect object pronouns do not agree with the past participle like the direct object pronouns do. When me, te, nous, and vous are used in a perfect tense, the writer must decide whether they are used as direct or indirect object pronouns. This is done by looking at the verb and seeing what type of action is being performed.

The bread is given by the man (direct). Pierre gets the given apple (indirect).

G: -exer Verbs
-exer are regular -er verbs, but also are stem changing. The stem change applies to all forms except nous and vous. The stem change involves adding a grave accent ( ` ) over the e in the stem.

G: -yer verbs
-yer verbs are regular -er verbs. However, when y is part of the last syllable, it changes to i in order to keep the ay sound. In the present indicative of -yer verbs, this affects all forms except nous and vous.

Payer
The verb payer translates to to pay.

Formation
In the present indicative, payer (and all other -yer verbs) is conjuagted as follows:

Lesson 2.04 • Going out
G: À and De
The preposition à can indicate a destination, a location, a characteristic, measurement, a point in time, purpose, and several other things which will be covered later. When le follows à, the à and le combine into au. Similarly, à and les combine into aux. The preposition de can indicate an origin, contents, possession, cause, manner, and several other things which will be covered later. When le follows de, the de and le combine into du. Similarly, de and les combine into des. live version discussion exercises edit lesson comment report an error ask a question

-enir verbs are irregularly conjugated (they does not count as regular -ir verbs).

Venir
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The most common -enir verb is venir. The verb venir is translated to to come. When it means to come from, venir is used with the preposition de. • Nous venons du stade. You can also use venir with a verb to state that you have recently accomplished an action. **Je viens de finir mes devoirs (I've just finished my homework).

Subject-Past Participle Agreement
The past participles of the above verbs must agree with the the subject of a sentence in gender and plurality. Note that there is no agreement if these verbs are conjugated with avoir.
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If the subject is masculine singular, there is no change in the past participle. If the subject is feminine singular, an -e is added to the past participle. If the subject is masculine plural, an -s is added to the past participle. If the subject is masculine singular, an -es is added to the past participle. Nous sommes allé(e)s. Vous êtes allé(e)(s). Ils sont allés. Elles sont allées.

J suis allé(e). Tu es allé(e). Il est allé. Elle est allés.

G: The Pronoun Y
Indirect Object Pronoun - to it, to them
The French pronoun y is used to replace an object of a prepositional phrase introduced by à.
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If the subject is performing the action on him or herself, the verbs are reflexive. However, if the subject were to act on someone else, the verb is no longer reflexive; instead the reflexive pronoun becomes a direct object.
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Je m'habille: I get (myself) dressed. Je t'habille: I get you dressed.

In the passé composé, the participle must agree in gender and number with the subject.
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G: Pronominal Verbs
Pronominal verbs are verbs that, put simply, include pronouns. These pronouns are me, te, se, nous, and vous and are used as either direct objects or indirect objects, depending on the verb that they modify. There are three types of pronominal verbs: reflexive verbs, reciprocal verbs, and naturally pronominal verbs.

Reciprocal Verbs
With reciprocal verbs, people perform actions to each other.
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Nous nous aimons. - We like each other.

Naturally Pronominal Verbs
Some verbs are pronominal without performing a reflexive or reciprocal action. Tu te souviens? - You remember?

V: At Work
travailler: to work travailler pour: to work for (somebody)

G: Devoir
French Verb • Everyday life devoir • to have to, to owe past participle: dû Singular Plural jeuh dwah I have to nous devons noo dehvohn too dwah you have to vous devez voo dehvay eel dwah he has to ils doivent eel dwahve ell dwah she has to ohn dwah one has to elles doivent ell dwahve

we have to you have to they have to (masc. or mized) they have to (fem.)

G: Falloir
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falloir - to be necessary il faut - it is necessary il a fallu - it was necessary (passé composé) il fallait - it was necessary (imparfait) il faudra - it will be necessary il faudrait - it would be necessary

The verb falloir differs from similar verbs such as avoir besoin de [faire quelque chose] (to need [to do something]) and devoir (must, duty, owe). Falloir is always used with the impersonal il only in the 3rd person singular, whereas devoir can be used with all subject pronouns in all tenses. Falloir expresses general necessities, such as "To live, one must eat" or "To speak French well, one must conjugate verbs correctly." Devoir expresses more personally what someone must do; "I want to pass my French test, so I must study verb conjugations." Avoir besoin de [faire quelque chose] expresses need; "I need to study for my test, it's tomorrow". congratulations on completing

G: Naître
French Verb • Rural life naître • to be born past participle: né(e)(s)1 Singular Plural first person je nais jeuh nay I am born nous naissons noo nehssohn we are born second person tu nais too nay you are born vous naissez voo nehssay you are born il naît eel nay he is born they are born ils naissent eel nesse (masc. or mized) third person elle naît ell nay she is born on naît ohn nay one is born elles naissent ell nesse they are born (fem.) 1 Naître is the only -aître verb that takes être as its helping verb (and therefore agrees with the subject as a past participle in perfect tenses).

G: Reflexive Verbs with Perfect Tenses
When proniminal verbs are conjugated in perfect tenses, être is used as the auxiliary verb.

Reflexive Verbs
In perfect tenses, the past participles agree with the direct object pronoun, but not the indirect object pronoun, in gender and plurality. Therefore it would only agree when the reflexive pronoun is the direct object. Also remember that the past participle does not agree with the direct object if it goes after the verb.
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Like reflexive verbs, the past participle of reciprocal verbs agrees in number and gender with the direct object if it goes before the verb. It therefore agrees with all reciprocal pronouns that function as direct objects. Nous nous sommes aimé(e)s. - We liked each other. Nous nous sommes parlé. - We spoke to each other. Elles se sont téléphoné. - They called to one another. Vous vous êtes écrit souvent? - You write to each other often?

The reciprocal pronoun can also function as an indirect object without a direct object pronoun.
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Naturally Pronominal Verbs
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In perfect tenses, these verbs agree with the direct object if it goes before the verb. Otherwise, the past participle agrees with the subject. Elle s'est souvenue. - She remembered. Le chien se couche. - The dog lies down.

Note that assis(e)(es), the past participle of s'asseoir (to sit), does not change in the masculine plural form. congratulations on completing

Lesson 2.08 • Food and drink
live version discussion G: -ger Verbs exercises -ger verbs are regular -er verbs that are also stem changing. The most common -ger edit lesson verb is manger. For manger and all other regular -ger verbs, the stem change is comment adding an e after the g. This only applies in the nous form. In this case, the change report an error is made to preserve the soft g pronunciation rather than the hard g that would be ask a question present if the e were not included.

G: Partitive Article
The partitive article de indicates, among other things, the word some. As learnt earlier, de and le contract (combine) into du, as de and les contract into des. Also, instead of du or de la, de l' is used in front of vowels. When speaking about food, the partitive article is used at some times while the definite article (le, la, les) is used at other times, and the indefinite article (un, une) in yet another set of situations. In general "de" refers to a part of food (a piece of pie) whereas the definite article (le) refers to a food in general (I like pie (in general)). The indefinite article refers to an entire unit of a food (I would like a (whole) pie). When speaking about preferences, use the definite article: J'aime la glace. I like ice cream.

Nous préférons le steak. We prefer steak. Vous aimez les frites You like French fries. When speaking about eating or drinking an item, there are specific situations for the use of each article. Def. art. J'ai mangé la tarte. Ind. art. Part. art. specific/whole items I ate the (whole) pie. known quantity unknown quantity

J'ai mangé une tarte. I ate a pie. J'ai mangé de la tarte. I ate some pie. In the negative construction, certain rules apply. As one has learnt in a previous lesson, un or une changes to de (meaning, in this context, any) in a negative construction. Similarly, du, de la, or des change to de in negative constructions. Nous avons mangé une tarte. Nous avons mangé de la tarte. Nous n'avons pas mangé de tarte. We ate a pie. We ate some pie.

Nous n'avons pas mangé de tarte. We did not eat a pie/ We did not eat any pie. We did not eat some pie/ We did not eat any pie. Note : Now you should understand better how that "Quoi de neuf?"(what's new?) encountered in the very first lesson was constructed... "Quoi de plus beau?!" (what is there prettier?)

G: En
Note how we say Je veux du pain to say 'I want some bread' ? But what happens when we want to say 'I want some' without specifying what we want? In these cases, we use the pronoun 'en'. As well, 'en' can mean 'of it' when 'it' is not specified. For instance, instead of saying J'ai besoin de l'argent, if the idea of money has already been raised, we can just say 'J'en ai besoin'. This is because what en does is replace du, de la or des when there is nothing after it. Like with 'me', 'te' and other pronouns, en (meaning 'some') comes before the verb. Tu joue du piano? Non, je n'en joue pas Vous prenez du poisson? Oui, j'en prends. Vous avez commandé de l'eau? Oui, nous en avons commandé. For more detailed information, see French Pronouns Do you play piano? No, I don't play it. Are you having fish? Yes, I'm having some. Did you order some water? Yes, we ordered some.

mettre - to put on, to turn on, to place permettre - to allow remettre - to put back remettre en place - to set back into place soumettre - to submit se remettre - to recover from an illness se remettre en route - to get back on the road

Idioms and Related Expressions
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mettre au jour - to bring to light mettre de l'argent de coté - to put money aside mettre fin à - to put an end to mettre la main à la pâte - to pitch in mettre le contact - to start the car mettre le couvert - to set the table se mettre à table - to sit down to eat se mettre d'accord - to agree se mettre en forme - to get in shape congratulations on completing

Canadian and Belgian French has an off-by-one behaviour with meals : breakfast is called déjeuner, lunch is called dîner and dinner is souper. 1. French butchers do not sell pork, pork products, nor horsemeat. For these products, go to a charcuterie. 2. In France, bakeries only sell fresh bread. Places where they sell bread that is not fresh are called dépôt de pain. 3. 'Charcuteries' sell things besides pork products, including pâte, salami, cold meats, salads, quiches and pizzas. 4. An alternative to an 'épicerie' is an alimentation générale (a general foodstore). 5. -eille is pronounced ay 6. Do not confuse with le livre (book).

Pouvoir is conjugated in a similar manner: French Verb • Dining pouvoir • to be able to past participle - pu first person je peux second person tu peux Singular jeuh nous I can/am able to peuh pouvons you can/are able too peuh vous pouvez to eel peuh he can/is able to ils peuvent she can/is able ell peuh to one can/is able ohn peuh elles peuvent to Plural noo poovohn we can/are able to

voo poovay you can/are able to eel peuhve ell peuhve they can/are able to (masc. or mized) they can/are able to (fem.)

French Level Three Lessons Formidable! - Intermediate French
After having completed the second level of the Wikibooks French language course, you can graduate to the third level. This is a much more rigorous presentation of the French language. Several verb tenses will be introduced in this level, and there will now be more vocabulary sections in each lesson. But we didn't decide to stop there! This level will include longer lectures about a lesson's subject and will introduce you to real French literary works and news articles, such as Jean de La Fontaine's Fables. After you have completed this level, you can move on to the next level. Also remember that if you would like to help develop this course, go to the lessons planning page.

V: Geography
Audio : French native speaker Geography the world le monde Political Geography a city une ville a village un village a country un pays a state un état Natural Geography river le fleuve mountain la montagne lake le lac ocean l'océan (m) Cardinal Directions north le nord south le sud east l'est west l'ouest

Most geographical areas are feminine Every French geographical area, with one or two exceptions, that ends in -e is feminine. Every continent is feminine. en is used to say in, at, to for all feminine geographical areas except cities • Je vais en France. - I go to France. de is used to say from for all feminine geographical areas except cities • Je reviens de France. - I return from France. de is contracted to d' when followed by a vowel. • Je vais en Espagne. - Je reviens d' Espagne

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Masculine Regions
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all regions that do not end in a slient e are mascuiline dans le is used to say in, at, to for most masculine regions, provinces, and states • Je vais dans le Limousin. - I'm going to Limousin. du, a contraction of de + le, is used to say from for most regions, provinces, and states • Je reviens du Limousin. - I return from Limousin. If a region is thought of or considered as its own sovereign state, au is used instead of dans le • Je vais au Québec. - Je reviens du Québec. • Je vais au Texas. - Je reviens du Texas.

Audio : French native speaker
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Masculine Countries Starting With a Consonant
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all countries that do not end in a silent e are mascuiline le Cambodge and le Mexique are masculine au is used to say in, at, to for masculine countries beginning with a consonant • Je vais au Portugal. - I'm going to Portugal. • du is used to say from for masculine countries beginning with a consonant • Je reviens du Portugal. - I return from Portugal.

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Plural Countries
Audio : French native speaker
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aux, a contraction of à + les, is used to say in, to, as if a plural article is part of the name of a country • Je vais aux Êtats-Unis. - I'm going to the United States. (pronounced aytahzoohnee) des, a contraction of de + les, is used to say from if a plural article is part of the name of a country • Je reviens des Êtats-Unis. - I return from the United States.

Masculine Countries Starting With a Vowel
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en is used to say in, at, to for all masculine countries beginning with a vowel • Je vais en Israël. - I'm going to Israel. d' is used to say from for all masculine countries beginning with a vowel • Je reviens d' Israël. - I return from Israel.

Check For Understanding
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Are all French countries ending in e feminine? What geographical areas use the preposition dans le? What prepositions do countries beginning with vowels use? What prepositions does the city of Quebec use? ...the province of Quebec?

Nationalities are not capitalized as often in French as they are in English. If you are referring to a person, as in an Arab person or a Chinese person, the French equivalent is un Arabe or un Chinois. However, if you are referring to the Arabic language or Chinese language, the French would not capitalize: l'arabe; le chinois. If the nationality is used as an adjective, it is normally left uncapitalized; un livre chinois, un tapis arabe.

G: Perfect Tenses
You will be learning several new perfect tenses in this level. Review the grammar behind them. This time, make sure you know all the rules.
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The perfect tenses are also called the compound or composed tenses. The perfect tenses are all composed of a conjugated auxillary verb and a fixed past participle.

Auxillary Verb Formation
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The auxillary verb is always either avoir or être. The tense of the verb depends upon the tense that avoir or être is conjugated in. • When the auxillary verb is conjugated in the passé composé, for example, the auxillary verb is conjugated in the present indicative. • J'ai fini. - I have finished.

The past pasticiple must agree with the direct object of a clause in gender and plurality if the direct object goes before the verb. • the direct object is masculine singular - no change • J'ai fini le jeu. - I have finished the game. • Je l'ai fini. - I have finished it. • the direct object is feminine singular - add an e to the past participle • J'ai fini la tâche. - I have finished the task. • Je l'ai finie. - I have finished it. • the direct object is masculine plural - add an s to the past participle. • J'ai fini les jeux. - I have finished the games. • Je les ai finis. - I have finished them. • the direct object is feminine plural - add an es to the past participle. • J'ai fini les tâches. - I have finished the tasks. • Je les ai finies. - I have finished them.

Avoir ou Être?
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In most circumstances, the auxillary verb is avoir. However, under certain situations, the auxillary verb is être. This occurs when: • The verb is one of 16 special verbs that take être. • Note that when a direct object is used with these verbs, the auxillary verb becomes avoir. • The verb is reflexive. • That is, the subject of the verb is also its object.

G: Simple Future of Regular Verbs
There are three versions of the futur tense in French, the futur simple the futur composé, and the futur antérieur(future perfect). The futur composé is formed by inserting the present form of aller before the infinitive, e.g. elle va réussir (she will pass, or she is going to pass) is the futur composé of elle réussit To conjugate a verb in the futur simple, one takes the infinitive and appends the right form of avoir except for nous and vous which takes -ons or -ez, as according to the table: Audio: French native speaker Add Ending Conjugated Verb Je -ai réussirai Tu -as réussiras Il / Elle / On -a réussira Nous -ons réussirons Vous -ez réussirez Ils / Elles -ont Réussiront Subject

Lesson 3.03 • Health
live version discussion V: Illness exercises French Vocabulary • Health • audio (115 kb • help) edit lesson Illness • La maladie comment To ache report an error to have a ...ache, to avoir mal à... avoir mal au ventre to have a bellyache ask a question hurt avoir mal à la to have a headache avoir mal partout to ache all over tête avoir mal â avoir des maux de to feel sick, to have an earache l'oreille cœur nauseaus avoir mal aux to have a toothache Actions dents Sickness and Pain éternuer to sneeze être malade to be sick s'évanouir to faint avoir la grippe to have the flu saigner to bleed avoir de la fièvre to have a fever tousser to cough être enrhumé to have a cold vomir to throw up

G: Issuing Commands in French - l'impératif
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The nous form commands are used to say "Let's...". The subject is not used when giving a command.

G: Adverbs
French adverbs, like their English counterparts, are used to modify French/Grammar/Adjectives, other adverbs, and French/Grammar/Verbs or clauses. They do not display any inflection; that is, their form does not change to reflect their precise role, nor any characteristics of what they modify.

Formation
In French, as in English, most adverbs are derived from adjectives. In most cases, this is done by adding the suffix -ment ("-ly") to the adjective's feminine singular form. For example, the feminine singular form of lent ("slow") is lente, so the corresponding adverb is lentement ("slowly"); similarly, heureux → heureusement ("happy" → "happily"). As in English, however, the adjective stem is sometimes modified to accommodate the suffix: Audio : Native French Speaker
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And, as in English, many common adverbs are not derived from adjectives at all:
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Placement
The placement of French adverbs is almost the same as the placement of English adverbs. Audio : Native French Speaker An adverb that modifies an adjective or adverb comes before that adjective or adverb:
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Direct Objects
While the subject of a sentence initiates an action (the verb), the direct object is the one that is affected by the action. A direct object pronoun is used to refer to the direct object of a previous sentence: Pierre vois le cambrioleur. Pierre sees the burglar. Pierre le vois. Pierre sees him. The following table shows the various types of direct object pronouns: French me, m' te, t' le, l' him, English me1 you1 it Notes:
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la, l' nous vous les her, it us1 you1 them

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me, te, nous, and vous are also used as indirect objects to mean to me, to you, to us, and to you respectively. The pronoun form with an apostrophe is used before a vowel. The direct object pronoun for nous and vous is the same as the subject. When the direct object comes before a verb in a perfect tense, a tense that uses a past participle, the direct object must agree in gender and plurality with the past participle. For example, in te phrase Je les ai eus, or I had them, the past participle would be spelled eus if the direct object, les, was referring to a masculine object, and eues if les is referring to a feminine object.

Indirect Objects
An indirect object is an object that would be asked for with To whom...? or From whom...?. It is called indirect because it occurs usually together with a direct object which is affected directly by the action: Il donne du pain à Pierre. The man gives some bread to Pierre. Il lui donne du pain. He gives bread to him. The following table shows the various types of direct object pronouns: lui to him, to English to me1 to you1 her Notes:
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French me, m' te, t'

nous vous

leur

to us1 to you1 to them

1

me, te, nous, and vous are also used as direct objects to mean me, you, us, and you respectively. The pronoun form with an apostrophe is used before a vowel. The direct object pronoun for nous and vous is the same as the subject. The indirect object pronouns do not agree with the past participle like the direct object pronouns do. When me, te, nous, and vous are used in a perfect tense, the writer must decide whether they are used as direct or indirect object pronouns. This is done by looking at the verb and seeing what type of action is being performed.

The bread is given by the man (direct). Pierre gets the given apple (indirect).

The Pronoun Y Indirect Object Pronoun - to it, to them
The French pronoun y is used to replace an object of a prepositional phrase introduced by à.
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Note that lui and leur, and not y, are used when the the object refers the a person or persons. Replacement of Places - there The French pronoun y replaces a prepositional phrase referring to a place that begins with any preoposition except de (for which en is used).
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Note that en, and not y is used when the object is of the preposition de. Idioms
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Ça y est! - It's Done! J'y suis! - I get it!

En
Note how we say Je veux du pain to say 'I want some bread' ? But what happens when we want to say 'I want some' without specifying what we want? In these cases, we use the pronoun 'en'. As well, 'en' can mean 'of it' when 'it' is not specified. For instance, instead of saying J'ai besoin de l'argent, if the idea of money has already been raised, we can just say 'J'en ai besoin'. This is because what en does is replace du, de la or des when there is nothing after it. Like with 'me', 'te' and other pronouns, en (meaning 'some') comes before the verb.

Lesson 3.05 • Youth
live version discussion G: Imperfect - Imparfait exercises The imparfait is used to "set the tone" of a past situation. An example in English edit lesson being: "We were singing when Dad came home." It tells what was going on when a comment particular action or event occured. In French, the above example would be: "Nous report an error chantions quand papa est rentré." ask a question In order to conjugate the imperfect,
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-yer Verbs
-yer verbs are regular -er verbs. However, when y is part of the last syllable, it changes to i in order to keep the ay sound. In the present indicative of -yer verbs, this affects all forms except nous and vous.

Lesson 3.06 • Adolescence
live version discussion G: Pronominal Verbs Review exercises Pronominal verbs are verbs that, put simply, include pronouns. These pronouns are edit lesson me, te, se, nous, and vous and are used as either direct objects or indirect objects, comment depending on the verb that they modify. When proniminal verbs are conjugated in report an error perfect tenses, être is used as the auxiliary verb. There are three types of ask a question pronominal verbs: reflexive verbs, reciprocal verbs, and naturally pronominal verbs.

Either the conjugated verb or the infinitive can be negated each with slightly different meanings.
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In perfect tenses, the past participles agree with the direct object pronoun, but not the indirect object pronoun, in gender and plurality. Therefore it would only agree when the reflexive pronoun is the direct object. Also remember that the past participle does not agree with the direct object if it goes after the verb.
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Reciprocal Verbs
With reciprocal verbs, people perform actions to each other.
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Nous nous aimons. - We like each other. Like reflexive verbs, the past participle of reciprocal verbs agrees in number and gender with the direct object if it goes before the verb. It therefore agrees with all reciprocal pronouns that function as direct objects. Nous nous sommes aimé(e)s. - We liked each other. Nous nous sommes parlé. - We spoke to each other. Elles se sont téléphoné. - They called to one another. Vous vous êtes écrit souvent? - You write to each other often?

The reciprocal pronoun can also function as an indirect object without a direct object pronoun.
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In perfect tenses, these verbs agree with the direct object if it goes before the verb. Otherwise, the past participle agrees with the subject. Elle s'est souvenue. - She remembered. rendre - to return, to give back se rendre (à) - to go (to)

Some verbs have different meanings as pronominal verbs.
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G: Plus-Que-Parfait
The plus-que-parfait is used when there are two occurrences in the past and one wants to symbolise that one occurrence happened before the other. In English, this is used in a phrase like "I had given him the toy before he went to sleep." In this example, there are two past tenses, but they occur at different times. The plus-que-parfait can be used to indicate the occurrence of one before the other. Essentially, the past before the past. In French, the plus-que-parfait is formed by conjugating the auxiliary verb in the imparfait and adding the past participle. So to conjugate je mange (I eat) in the plus-que-parfait, one finds the appropriate auxiliary verb (avoir), conjugates it (avais) and finds the past participle of manger (mangé). So, the conjugation of Je mange in the plus-que-parfait becomes j'avais mangé or, in English, I had eaten.

Examples
J'ai parlé français. Je parlais français. I spoke French (on one particular occasion). I spoke French (during a period of time, and I don't speak French any more).

Nous avons réussi We passed the test. l'examen. Il a été mon ami. He was my friend (and he is not my friend any more) Il était mon ami lorsque... He was my friend when . . . Ils ont fait leurs devoirs. They did their homework. Il est venu. He came (and I don't need to say when) Il vint le lendemain. He came the day after. Il venait tous les jours. He came/used to come every day. Il était déjà venu. He had already come. It should be noted that these examples are making use of all the possible past tenses; not just the plusque-parfait. congratulations on completing

Lesson 3.07 • History
live version discussion exercises G: Passé Simple of Regular Verbs edit lesson comment Unlike English, there is a literary past tense, used when writing formally. This past tense is the passé simple. It is relatively simple to predict when to use this tense: for report an error every occurrence of the passé composé in conversational French, one simply uses ask a question the passé simple in literary French. Note that the passé simple is not a composed tense, and therefore does not have an auxiliary verb like the passé composé does. L'histoire de la France jusqu'en 1700.

relative pronouns begin adjective clauses • the man that was here • the man that I saw qui is the subject of the clause it introduces • Je vois l'homme qui l'a fait. - I see the man that did it. • L'homme qui l'a fait est ici. - The man that did it is here. que is the direct object of the clause it introduces • Il est l'homme que j'ai vu. - He is the man that I have seen. remember that in perfect tenses, the past participle agrees with the direct object in gender and plurality if the direct object comes before the verb • Elles sont les femmes que j'ai vues. - They are the women that I have seen. If que is folled by a vowel, it is shortened to qu'. • Il est l'homme qu'il a vu. - He is the man that he has seen. qui is never shortened, even when followed by a vowel qui and que can modify both people and things • Je vois la voiture qui est cassé. - I see the car that is broken. qui and que can modify both masculine and feminine nouns qui and que can modify both singular and plural nouns in the phrases ce qui and ce que, which literally mean that which, but more naturally mean what, ce is the noun congratulations on completing

Lesson 3.09 • Modern France
G: Comparative
French Grammar • Modern France The Comparative • Le Comparatif Adjectives Sub. + Verb Comparative Adjective Comparative Je suis plus intelligent que I am more intelligent than Je suis moins intelligent que I am less intelligent than Je suis aussi intelligent que I am as intelligent as Adverbs Sub. + Verb Comparative Adverb Comparative Je vois plus/aussi/moins clairement que more than I see as clearly as less than Verbs Sub. Verb Comparative Comparative Je joue plus/autant/moins que more than I play as much as less than Nouns Sub. + Verb Comparative Noun Comparative plus de Je joue à autant de jeux que moins de more than I play as many games as less than live version discussion exercises edit lesson comment report an error ask a question

Use
Phrases constructed in the future perfect tense mean "will have ___ed" in both French and English. This construction is used to say that before an event occurs, something else "will have" occured by that time.

Special Rules
Adjectives That Precede Nouns
Adjectives that are used frequently go before nouns. These are:
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beau nouveau vieux bon mauvais petit grand long joli jeune gros

Changes in Meaning When grand goes before a noun, it means great. However, when it goes after the noun, it means tall. Likewise, when pauvre goes before a noun, it means unfortunate. When it comes after the noun, it means financially poor. This rule works most of the time, but be careful, "pauvre" can mean "financially poor" even when used before the nouns.

Possessive Adjectives
In English, we say "her car" when the owner of the car is a woman and "his car" when the owner is a man. In French, they say "sa voiture" even if the owner is a male. It is not the owner who determines the gender of the possessive adjective but the object owned. First person singular - mon, ma, mes Second person singular (informal) - ton, ta, tes Third person singular - son, sa, ses First person plural - notre, notre, nos Second person plural (and polite form) - votre, votre, vos Third person plural - leur, leur, leurs Grammar

Adverbs
French adverbs, like their English counterparts, are used to modify live version French/Grammar/Adjectives, other adverbs, and French/Grammar/Verbs or clauses. discussion They do not display any inflection; that is, their form does not change to reflect exercises their precise role, nor any characteristics of what they modify. edit lesson comment report an error Formation ask a question In French, as in English, most adverbs are derived from adjectives. In most cases, this is done by adding the suffix -ment ("-ly") to the adjective's feminine singular form. For example, the feminine singular form of lent ("slow") is lente, so the corresponding adverb is lentement ("slowly"); similarly, heureux → heureusement ("happy" → "happily"). As in English, however, the adjective stem is sometimes modified to accommodate the suffix:
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Gender
Gender of Nouns
In French, all nouns have a grammatical gender, that is, they are masculine or feminine for the purposes of grammar only. Most nouns that express entities with gender (people and animals) use both a feminine form and a masculine form, for example, the two words for "actor" in French are acteur (m) and actrice (f). The nouns that express entities without gender (e.g., objects and abstract concepts) have only one form. This form can be masculine or feminine. For example, la voiture (the car) can only be feminine; le stylo (the pen) can only be masculine. There are some nouns that express entities with gender for which there is only one form, which is used regardless of the actual gender of the entity, for example, the word for person; personne; is always feminine, even if the person is male, and the word for teacher; professeur; is always masculine even if the teacher is female. live version discussion exercises edit lesson comment report an error ask a question

Examples French Grammar • Gender • audio (info •113 kb • help) Gender of Nouns • Genre des Noms Common Endings Used Masculine With Masculine Nouns: le fromage le cheval the horse -age the cheese le professeur le chien the dog -r the teacher le chat le livre the book -t the cat le capitalisme le bruit the noise -isme capitalism Common Endings Used Feminine With Feminine Nouns: la boulangerie la colombe the dove -ie the bakery la nation la chemise the shirt -ion the nation la fraternité la maison the house -ite/-ité brotherhood la balance la liberté liberty -nce the scales la fille -nne the girl -mme l’indienne -lle the Indian Unfortunately, there are many exceptions in French which can only be learned. There are even words that are spelled the same, but have a different meaning when masculine or feminine; for example, un livre (m) means a book, but une livre (f) means a pound! Some words that appear to be masculine (like la photo, which is actually short for la photographie) are in fact feminine, and vice versa. Then there are some that just don't make sense; la foi is feminine and means a belief, whereas le foie means liver. To help overcome this hurdle which many beginners find very difficult, be sure to learn the genders along with the words.

Definite and Indefinite Articles
The Definite Article
In English, the definite article is always “the”. In French, the definite article is changed depending on the noun's: 1. Gender 2. Plurality 3. First letter of the word There are three definite articles and an abbreviation. "Le" is used for masculine nouns, "La" is used for feminine nouns, "Les" is used for plural nouns (both masculine or feminine), and "L' " is used when the noun begins with a vowel or silent "h" (both masculine or feminine). It is similar to english, where "a" changes to "an" before a vowel. French Grammar • Gender • audio (info •78 kb • help) The Definite Article • L'article défini feminine la la fille the daughter singular le le fils the son singular, starting with a vowel l’ l’enfant the child sound les filles the daughters plural les les fils the sons les enfants the children Note: Unlike English, the definite article is used to talk about something in a general sense, a general statement or feeling about an idea or thing.

The Indefinite Article
In English, the indefinite articles are "a" and "an". "Some" is used as a plural article in English. Again, indefinite articles in French take different forms depending on gender and plurality. The articles "Un" and "une" literally mean "one" in French. French Grammar • Gender • audio (info •55 kb • help) The Indefinite Article • L'article indéfini feminine une une fille a daughter singular masculine un un fils a son des filles some daughters plural des des fils1 some sons

1"des

fils" does mean "some sons" but is an homograph: it can also mean "some threads"

Also note that des, like les is used in French before plural nouns when no article is used in English. Let's imagine you are looking at photographs in an album. In English, we would say "I am looking at photographs." In French, you cannot say, "Je regarde photographies," you must tell which photographs you are looking at using an article. If you were looking at a set of specific pictures, you would say "Je regarde les photographies." ("I am looking at the photographs.") If you were just flipping through the album, looking at nothing in particular, you would say, "Je regard des photographies." ("I am looking at some photographs.")

Subject pronouns
French has six different types of pronouns: the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd person singular and the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd person plural. French Grammar • Gender • audio (info •61 kb • help) Subject Pronouns • Les pronoms soumis singular je I 1st person plural nous we singular tu you 2nd person plural vous you singular il, elle, on he, she, one 3rd person they (masculine) plural ils, elles they (feminine) When referring to more than one person in the 2nd person, “vous” must be used. When referring to a single person, “vous” or “tu” may be used depending on the situation; see notes in lesson 1. In addition to the nuances between vous and tu, as discussed in lesson 1, French pronouns carry meanings that do not exist in English pronouns. The French third person "on" has several meanings, but most closely matches the now archaic English "one". While in English, "One must be very careful in French grammar" sounds old-fashioned, the French equivalent "On doit faire très attention à la grammaire française" is quite acceptable. Also, while the third person plural "they" has no gender in English, the French equivalents "ils" and "elles" do. However, when pronounced, they normally sound the same as "il" and "elle", so distinguishing the difference requires understanding of the various conjugations of the verbs following the pronoun. Also, if a group of people consists of both males and females, the male form is used, even if there is only one male in a group of thousands of females. In everyday language, “on” is used, instead of “nous”, to express “we”; the verb is always used in the 3rd person singular. For example, to say "We (are) meeting at 7 o'clock", you could say either “On se rencontre au cinéma à sept heures.” (colloquial) or “Nous nous rencontrons au cinéma à sept heures.” (formal). For more, see the Wikipedia entry. Grammar

Simple negation is done by wrapping ne...pas around the verb. • Je ne vole pas. - I do not steal. In a perfect tense, ne...pas wraps around the auxillary verb, not the participle. • Je n'ai pas volé. - I have never stolen. When an infinitive and conjugated verb are together, ne...pas usually wraps around the conjugated verb. • Je ne veux pas voler. - I do not want to steal. ne pas can also go directly in front of the infinitive for a different meaning. • Je veux ne pas voler. - I want to not steal. ne goes before any pronoun relating to the verb it affects. • Je ne le vole pas. - I did not steal it.

live version discussion exercises edit lesson comment report an error ask a question

Other Negative Expressions
ne...aucun(e) ne...jamais ne...ni...ni not any, none, no never neither...nor

Prepositions
Common Prepositions
live version discussion exercises edit lesson comment report an error ask a question Notes -Expresses a report/ratio of place (to), time (at), possession (of or 's), means, manner, price. - Introduced a complement of indirect object or a complement of attribution, a complement of the name or adjective. Alternative: dedans (rarely used as a preposition) On mange après avoir bu We eat after we drink Also an adverb.

next to, besides inside after beyond with at the home of against in 1. of, from 2. about outside behind in front of in between here far Used mostly to indicate distance in time or space. Also a pronoun. Also a conjugation of the verb entrer. La paille est contre la maison the straw is against the house Synonym: en Also an indefinite artcle. Contractions: du, des IPA: /də/

par près de pour sans selon

1. through 2. by, for near for without 1. according to 2. in accordance with below, under 1. on 2. upon 3. on top of 4. above 5. out of 6. sept sur dix (seven out of ten) Grammar

The pronoun on
The subject pronoun on is analogous to the English personal pronoun one, except that it is not so formal, and is more common. It has a number of uses:
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It is used in the same ways as the English personal pronoun one: • It is used in expressing generalities: « C'est en forgeant qu'on devient forgeur. » ("It is by blacksmithing that one becomes a blacksmith.") • It is the implicit subject for an infinitive that has no other implicit subject: « penser qu'on a raison » ("to think that one is right," i.e. "to think oneself right"). Because of French's limited passive voice, it is often used as an empty subject when the agent is unknown or unimportant: « On me l'a donné. » ("[On] gave it to me" or "I was given it" or "It was given to me.") It is used as a less formal substitute for the subject pronoun nous (we). In this case, note that even though on always takes a third-person singular verb, it takes plural adjectives (« On est américains », "We're American"). Also, note that the other forms of nous (direct object, indirect object, and disjunctive) are not replaced by forms of on unless on is the subject as well. (Hence, « Ils nous l'ont donné », "They gave it to us," but « On se l'est donné », "We gave it to ourselves.") It is not the number 1, and therefore is not used to mean "one of them." In French as in English, numbers can be used as pronouns — « Deux sont entrés et un est ressorti »,

"Two went in and one came back out" — but the number 1 is un(e), not on. On does not have ordinary direct- and indirect-object pronouns, only the reflexive pronoun se. Similarly, its disjunctive-pronoun form, soi, is only used when on is the subject and soi refers to the same entity. The pronoun quelqu'un ("someone") can fill some of the roles of on, in the same way that one and someone are sometimes interchangeable in English.

me, te, nous, and vous
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Direct and Indirect Object Pronouns

Meanings
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me - me, to me te - you, to you (singular, informal) lui - to him nous - us, to us vous - you, to you (plural, formal) leurs - to them

Place in sentences
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These pronouns are placed before the verb that they modify • Je te vois. - I see you. • Je veux te voir. - I want to see you. If a perfect tense is used, these pronouns go before the auxillary verb. • Je t'ai vu. - I saw you.

le, la, and les
le, la, and les are called direct object pronouns, because they are pronouns that are, you guessed it, used as direct object. A direct object is a noun that receives the action of a verb.
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Il jette la boule. - He throws the ball.

In the above sentence la boule is the direct object.

You have learned earlier that names and regular nouns can be replaced by the subject pronouns (je, tu...). Similary, direct objects, such as "la boule", can be replaced by pronouns.
• • • •

Whether lui means to him or to her is given by context. In English, "He throws him the ball" is also said, and means the same thing. When used with the direct object pronouns le, la, and les, lui and leur come after those pronouns.
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Il la lui jette. - He throws it to him.

Note that while le, la, and les are used to replace people or inanimate objects, lui and leur are not used to replace innanimate objects and things. Also note that unlike le and la, which are shortened to l' when followed by a vowel, lui is never shortened

y
Indirect Object Pronoun - to it, to them
The French pronoun y is used to replace an object of a prepositional phrase introduced by à.

Note that en, and not y is used when the object is of the preposition de.

Idioms
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Ça y est! - It's Done! J'y suis! - I get it!

en
Replacement of a Partitive Construction Replacement of Quantified Nouns Replacement of Phrases with de
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The pronoun en replaces prepositional phrases beginning with de if the object of the preposition is referring to a thing or place. • Je viens de Paris. - I come from Paris. • J' en viens. - I come from it. Note that stress pronouns, and not en are used if the object refers to a person or persons.

Pronoun Order
Order Chart
If a sentence uses no infinitive, the pronouns are embedded as follows:

When a sentence uses the indirect object pronouns me, te, nous, and vous with the direct object pronouns le, la, and les, me, te, nous, and vous go first. • Il me le donne. - He gave it to me. When a sentence uses the indirect object pronouns lui and leur with the direct object pronouns le, la, and les, le, la, and les go first. • Il le lui donne. - He gave it to him/her. When y is used in the same sentence as other pronouns, y goes after all of them with the exception of en. • Il m'emmène à Paris. - He takes me to Paris. • Il m'y emmène. - He takes me there. Y in conjunction with en is only used in a few cases. • Il y en a. - There exist several ones. When there are two pronouns in a sentence, en always go last.

L'impératif
When expressing positive commands, there are several rules one must remember when using object pronouns. Theses are:
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The pronouns are attached the the verb with a hyphen. • Retrouve-la. - Find it. Me and Te become moi and toi. • Donnez-moi les vidéos. - Give me the videos. Le, la, and les precede all other object pronouns. • Donnez-le-moi. - Give it to me.

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General Notes
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The masculine form and feminine form of the third person are conjugated in exactly the same manner. Instead of mentioning both, only the masculine form will be used for the sake of brevity. One may assume that il includes elle and ils includes elles unless the context clearly indicates otherwise. In tables showing the endings or conjugations of verbs, an accent mark is shown without a letter below it indicates that the accent mark is placed above the last letter of the stem. Derivatives of a verb are conjugated in the same manner as that verb. For instance, devenir and revenir follow the same patterns as venir. In this appendix, when the conjugation of the root verb is given, it is assumed that the reader will know that derivative verbs are similarly conjugated. The verb tenses here are organized by mood. The general uses of a particular mood will be covered in the page linkd to by the section heading. Literary tenses, which are only used in formal writing, are in italics. Grammar

Irregular Conjugations
You spend a lot of time in French learning the grammatical rules - there are some words which break these rules, and they are listed below, with what they do. Also see wiktionary:Category:French verbs and wiktionary:fr:Catégorie:Verbes français. live version discussion exercises edit lesson comment report an error ask a question

voul- [vul-] imparfait 1 The imperative forms veux, voulons, and voulez are rare. 2 The imperative form veuillez is used to make very polite requests. It is most often used on signs and in impersonal writing. (e.g. "Veuillez suivre les instructions ci-dessous.")

Pronominal
Pronominal verbs are verbs that, put simply, include pronouns. These pronouns are me, te, se, nous, and vous and are used as either direct objects or indirect objects, depending on the verb that they modify. When proniminal verbs are conjugated in perfect tenses, être is used as the auxiliary verb. There are three types of pronominal verbs: reflexive verbs, reciprocal verbs, and naturally pronominal verbs. live version discussion exercises edit lesson comment report an error ask a question

Either the conjugated verb or the infinitive can be negated each with slightly different meanings.
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Je ne vais pas me laver. - I'm not going to wash myself.

In perfect tenses, the past participles agree with the direct object pronoun, but not the indirect object pronoun, in gender and plurality. Therefore it would only agree when the reflexive pronoun is the direct object. Also remember that the past participle does not agree with the direct object if it goes after the verb.
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Reciprocal Verbs
With reciprocal verbs, people perform actions to each other.
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Nous nous aimons. - We like each other. Like reflexive verbs, the past participle of reciprocal verbs agrees in number and gender with the direct object if it goes before the verb. It therefore agrees with all reciprocal pronouns that function as direct objects. Nous nous sommes aimé(e)s. - We liked each other. Nous nous sommes parlé. - We spoke to each other. Elles se sont téléphoné. - They called to one another. Vous vous êtes écrit souvent? - You write to each other often?

The reciprocal pronoun can also function as an indirect object without a direct object pronoun.
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In perfect tenses, these verbs agree with the direct object if it goes before the verb. Otherwise, the past participle agrees with the subject. Elle s'est souvenue. - She remembered. rendre - to return, to give back se rendre (à) - to go (to)

Some verbs have different meanings as pronominal verbs.
• •

Reflexive Verbs Details
Reflexive Verbs in French are actions that one does to oneself. They can be recognised because their infinitive form has the pronoun se in front of it or s' before a vowel. When conjugating a reflexive verb you must use the correct reflexive pronoun. The following tables show which reflexive pronoun to use with each form of the verb:
Subject je tu il nous vous ils Reflexive Pronoun me te se nous vous se

The Months of the Year • Les mois de l'année French Pron. English janvier jzahnveeyay January février fayvreeyay February mars mahrse March avril ahvrill April mai maye May juin jzwan Juin juillet jzooeeyay July août oot/oo August septembre septahmbruh September octobre oktuhbruh October novembre novahmbruh November decembre daysahmbruh December The months of the year are not capitalized in French. For phrases relating to the months of the year, see the phrasebook

Appendix A.05 • Slang
Notes on how to use slang
Foreign speakers
It is important to note that, as a foreigner, your use of slang will often be received as cute or funny, depending greatly upon your overall fluency in spoken French. To understand this, think on how it would sound to you if a foreigner—with a strong accent and odd rythym of speech—came up to you and said "Dude, what a sketchyass hater that bizz-natch was, I totally was just like 'fuck off o-sheezy'". Therefore, no matter how much slang you use in your native language, limiting your use of slang in French (proportionally to your level of fluency) will also limit how much you are patronized and giggled at by native listeners. live version discussion edit appendix comment report an error ask a question

Slang: consistency & style
To use slang effeciently, it is important to maintain a consistency of style. Mixing styles might sound like saying: "Thy face, it is quite finely rawkin'".
• •

Avoid vous unless a plural is necessary. Avoid subject-verb inversion in questions. Use rather question formations where there is no inversion or 'est-ce que', only the raised tone at the end of the sentence. When doing this with interrogatives (qui, quand, comment, etc.), place them at the end of the sentence; i.e. "On va bouffer quand?"

Glossary
Notes on Pronunciation: *To feel how R should be pronounced, gargle with water, then try gargling without water. That is what your throat should be doing when pronouncing the R. *The U is hardest for English speakers. The back of the throat should be stretched out as if you see a mouse and are saying "eee!", but the lips should be in a tight circle as if you are saying "ooo".

Macdo Short for MacDonald's. mack-doh Merde n., excl., translated as 'shit', merde is not seen as vulgar as 'shit'. That is to say, adults use it often, as well as the youth. It can also mean 'rubbish', for example 'Ce repas, c'est de la merde', or 'The meal is crap' This word has produced the phrase «le mot de cinq lettres», an exact transcribed meaning of the English phase "four-letter word". maRed / with emphasis or in exclamation: mare-DUH N'importe quoi exp., 'whatever' n., bullshit as in "C'est du n'importe quoi, ce qu'il dit" nahm-poRt-UH-kwah Niquer v. Slang for 'to have sexual intercourse'. Often used in insults such as 'Nique ta mère' (Fuck your mother), sometimes reduced to 'Ta mère!'. Metaphorically, slang for 'to break' or 'to be great'. 'Je vais te niquer ta gueule (vulgaire)' : je vais me battre contre toi ! e.g. 'Cette porte est niquée.' (This door is out of order.) 'Ce jeu nique tout.' (This game is great.) NEEK-ay Ouais 'yeah' (as opposed to "oui" = "yes") waay Putain n., excl. Roughly equivalent to 'merde' when used as an exclamation. As a name, old form for 'pute' (whore). 'Putain' is the closest equivalent to the English 'fuck' (see note on 'fuck'). pew-tAÑ Super adj., 'very', 'really' ; "Je suis super content" = "I'm really happy" soup-air Taff n. work, job, task taff Truc n. Stuff trew-uhk Tronche

n. Colloquial word meaning 'face'. TRon-shuh Vachement adj., France, slang. Literally "cowly", vachement is a synonym for "very", and can be translated in some cases for the English adjective 'quite'. For instance - 'Il est vachement idiot' could be translated as 'He is quite stupid'. Whilst on the subject of 'vache', a popular French phrase is 'la vache!' which, as an exclamation, means 'damn!' or 'darn!'. For example - 'tu as perdu!' could be greeted with 'la vache!' or 'mince!' or other such expressions of discontent. It can however be used sometimes as an exclamation of surprise or amazement 'la vache! c'est genial ce truc' vah-shuh; vah-shuh-MAWÑ Zinzin n. Colloquial word meaning 'crazy'.

Verlan
Verlan is roughly similar to English Pig Latin, in that certain words are split in half, and the two componenents switch positions, but do not necessarily retain all letters (due to French pronunciation patterns). For example, if you have word [12], in verlan it will become [2-1]. The word verlan is in itself an example of this; it comes from the word l'envers (meaning 'backwards'). Verlan is, unlike Pig Latin, quite commonly used among young adults and even adults. Common verlan expressions include: Beur ou rebeu n., A person of Arab descent. from arabe. ('Beur' is so commonly used that it now has its own Verlan form, 'reub'). Chelou adj., Fishy, shady, suspicious. from louche. Keuf Policeman (not polite) from flic "Il est chelou ce mec ! j'vais le balancer aux keufs." Meuf n., Woman, chick, girl. from femme. Ouf adj., Crazy, ridiculous. from fou. Used commonly in the expression "c'est un truc de ouf" ("that is some crazy shit"). Relou adj., Not funny, difficult, something that sucks. from lourd, heavy. (the d is dropped in Verlan because the final d does not pronounce in lourd). Ripou adj., Rotten, awful, gross. from pourri Ripou = un policier qui commet des actes graves illégaux pl : des ripoux Teuf n., Party. from fête. Venère adj., aggravated, angry, pissed off. from enervé(e).

Common Chat Abbreviations
There are two general guidelines:
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•

é can be susbstituted for all homophonic equivalents including "-ais", "-ait", "-es" (such as in the articles les and des), the conjunction "et" (and), and the verb "est" (third person sing. conjugation of être, "to be"). words that end in a silent -s commonly drop this s: such as pas (pa), and vois (voi). n., bisous, "kisses".

Appendix A.06 • Typing characters
International Keyboard Configuration
Commonly one memorises the alt-number code for inserting non-English characters (below), but there is a much better method. One can change their keyboard configuration from their previous setting to a US (Qwerty) International setting. See http://www.starr.net/kbh for more information. In Windows XP:
1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. Start -> Settings -> Control Panel Regional and Language Options Languages -> Details ... Click Add. Under Input language, choose your native language. Under Keyboard layout/IME, choose United States-International.

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Now to form accents, you prefix the letter with either ` ' " ~ or ^ So, to get è, one types ` and then e. To get Ë, one types " and then E.
ù Alt+151 or Alt+0249 û Alt+150 or Alt+0251 ü Alt+129 or Alt+0252

In Mac OS X
You could change your keyboard layout in System Preferences->International->Input Menu or with the default qwerty keyboard layout you can use meta keys to create the accents. For instance if you want to create an "`" accent you would press option+` then press the vowel you want to appear under the letter to create à, è, ì, ò, or ù. The keystrokes for the diffent accents are...
option option option option + + + + "`" "e" "i" "u" = = = = ` ´ ˆ ¨

Copy & Paste
This method can be useful if you are just writing a short text (for example an e-mail) and don't have a computer where you can/want change language settings. Just try to pull up a web page or a document that contains the special characters and paste them into your text. For longer texts, however, this can become quite tedious.

Search & Replace
If you are working with a text editor you have the option to search for text and replace it with other text. This feature can be used to 'type' special characters. The idea is to mark a character for becoming a special character, for example typing ~a when you mean à. After you have written your text you replace marked characters (the ~a) with special characters (the à). Of course you have to either type in the Alt number code or paste the character, but the point is that you only have to do it once for the whole text and not for every single à that you want to type.

Unix and the Compose key
If you are using Unix or a derivative operating system (such as Linux) with XFree86, you can define a compose key by opening a terminal window and typing:
To use the xmodmap -e To use the xmodmap -e To use the xmodmap -e Windows menu key (between the right Windows key and right Ctrl key: "keysym Menu = Multi_key" right Windows key: "keysym R_Meta = Multi_key" right Alt key: "keysym Alt_Gr = Multi_key"

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Learning french
• • • • • • • • • • • • •

About.com French Language Anne Fox BBC Jump-Gate University of Adelaide, Australia French Language Learning Software Free Online French Tutorial BBC Bitesize grammar TravelWiki Phrasebook Orbis Latinus French MIT French I Assignments MIT French II Assignments Useful information on the French language can be found on the site of tv5 (www.tv5.org) Dictionnaire de langue francaise, Dictionnaire de synonymes, Conjugaisons, Dictionnaire anglais/francais, Dictionnaire francais/anglais, and lots more!

French grammar
Wikipedia has more about this subject: French language French grammar
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License and Distrubtion
Copyright (c) 2006 Wikibooks. Permission is granted to copy, distribute and/or modify this document under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.2 or any later version published by the Free Software Foundation; with no Invariant Sections, no FrontCover Texts, and no Back-Cover Texts. A copy of the license is included in the section entitled "GNU Free Documentation License".

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4. MODIFICATIONS
You may copy and distribute a Modified Version of the Document under the conditions of sections 2 and 3 above, provided that you release the Modified Version under precisely this License, with the Modified Version filling the role of the Document, thus licensing distribution and modification of the Modified Version to whoever possesses a copy of it. In addition, you must do these things in the Modified Version:

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A. Use in the Title Page (and on the covers, if any) a title distinct from that of the Document, and from those of previous versions (which should, if there were any, be listed in the History section of the Document). You may use the same title as a previous version if the original publisher of that version gives permission. B. List on the Title Page, as authors, one or more persons or entities responsible for authorship of the modifications in the Modified Version, together with at least five of the principal authors of the Document (all of its principal authors, if it has fewer than five), unless they release you from this requirement. C. State on the Title page the name of the publisher of the Modified Version, as the publisher. D. Preserve all the copyright notices of the Document. E. Add an appropriate copyright notice for your modifications adjacent to the other copyright notices. F. Include, immediately after the copyright notices, a license notice giving the public permission to use the Modified Version under the terms of this License, in the form shown in the Addendum below. G. Preserve in that license notice the full lists of Invariant Sections and required Cover Texts given in the Document's license notice. H. Include an unaltered copy of this License. I. Preserve the section Entitled "History", Preserve its Title, and add to it an item stating at least the title, year, new authors, and publisher of the Modified Version as given on the Title Page. If there is no section Entitled "History" in the Document, create one stating the title, year, authors, and publisher of the Document as given on its Title Page, then add an item describing the Modified Version as stated in the previous sentence. J. Preserve the network location, if any, given in the Document for public access to a Transparent copy of the Document, and likewise the network locations given in the Document for previous versions it was based on. These may be placed in the "History" section. You may omit a network location for a work that was published at least four years before the Document itself, or if the original publisher of the version it refers to gives permission. K. For any section Entitled "Acknowledgements" or "Dedications", Preserve the Title of the section, and preserve in the section all the substance and tone of each of the contributor acknowledgements and/or dedications given therein.

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L. Preserve all the Invariant Sections of the Document, unaltered in their text and in their titles. Section numbers or the equivalent are not considered part of the section titles. M. Delete any section Entitled "Endorsements". Such a section may not be included in the Modified Version. N. Do not retitle any existing section to be Entitled "Endorsements" or to conflict in title with any Invariant Section. O. Preserve any Warranty Disclaimers.

If the Modified Version includes new front-matter sections or appendices that qualify as Secondary Sections and contain no material copied from the Document, you may at your option designate some or all of these sections as invariant. To do this, add their titles to the list of Invariant Sections in the Modified Version's license notice. These titles must be distinct from any other section titles. You may add a section Entitled "Endorsements", provided it contains nothing but endorsements of your Modified Version by various parties--for example, statements of peer review or that the text has been approved by an organization as the authoritative definition of a standard. You may add a passage of up to five words as a Front-Cover Text, and a passage of up to 25 words as a Back-Cover Text, to the end of the list of Cover Texts in the Modified Version. Only one passage of Front-Cover Text and one of Back-Cover Text may be added by (or through arrangements made by) any one entity. If the Document already includes a cover text for the same cover, previously added by you or by arrangement made by the same entity you are acting on behalf of, you may not add another; but you may replace the old one, on explicit permission from the previous publisher that added the old one. The author(s) and publisher(s) of the Document do not by this License give permission to use their names for publicity for or to assert or imply endorsement of any Modified Version.

5. COMBINING DOCUMENTS
You may combine the Document with other documents released under this License, under the terms defined in section 4 above for modified versions, provided that you include in the combination all of the Invariant Sections of all of the original documents, unmodified, and list them all as Invariant Sections of your combined work in its license notice, and that you preserve all their Warranty Disclaimers. The combined work need only contain one copy of this License, and multiple identical Invariant Sections may be replaced with a single copy. If there are multiple Invariant Sections with the same name but different contents, make the title of each such section unique by adding at the end of it, in parentheses, the name of the original author or publisher of that section if known, or else a unique number. Make the same adjustment to the section titles in the list of Invariant Sections in the license notice of the combined work. In the combination, you must combine any sections Entitled "History" in the various original documents, forming one section Entitled "History"; likewise combine any sections Entitled "Acknowledgements", and any sections Entitled "Dedications". You must delete all sections Entitled "Endorsements."

6. COLLECTIONS OF DOCUMENTS
You may make a collection consisting of the Document and other documents released under this License, and replace the individual copies of this License in the various documents with a single copy that is included in the collection, provided that you follow the rules of this License for verbatim copying of each of the documents in all other respects. You may extract a single document from such a collection, and distribute it individually under this License, provided you insert a copy of this License into the extracted document, and follow this License in all other respects regarding verbatim copying of that document.

7. AGGREGATION WITH INDEPENDENT WORKS
A compilation of the Document or its derivatives with other separate and independent documents or works, in or on a volume of a storage or distribution medium, is called an "aggregate" if the copyright resulting from the compilation is not used to limit the legal rights of the compilation's users beyond what the individual works permit. When the Document is included in an aggregate, this License does not apply to the other works in the aggregate which are not themselves derivative works of the Document. If the Cover Text requirement of section 3 is applicable to these copies of the Document, then if the Document is less than one half of the entire aggregate, the Document's Cover Texts may be placed on covers that bracket the Document within the aggregate, or the electronic equivalent of covers if the Document is in electronic form. Otherwise they must appear on printed covers that bracket the whole aggregate.

8. TRANSLATION
Translation is considered a kind of modification, so you may distribute translations of the Document under the terms of section 4. Replacing Invariant Sections with translations requires special permission from their copyright holders, but you may include translations of some or all Invariant Sections in addition to the original versions of these Invariant Sections. You may include a translation of this License, and all the license notices in the Document, and any Warranty Disclaimers, provided that you also include the original English version of this License and the original versions of those notices and disclaimers. In case of a disagreement between the translation and the original version of this License or a notice or disclaimer, the original version will prevail. If a section in the Document is Entitled "Acknowledgements", "Dedications", or "History", the requirement (section 4) to Preserve its Title (section 1) will typically require changing the actual title.

9. TERMINATION
You may not copy, modify, sublicense, or distribute the Document except as expressly provided for under this License. Any other attempt to copy, modify, sublicense or distribute the Document is void, and will automatically terminate your rights under this License. However, parties who have received copies, or rights, from you under this License will not have their licenses terminated so long as such parties remain in full compliance.

10. FUTURE REVISIONS OF THIS LICENSE
The Free Software Foundation may publish new, revised versions of the GNU Free Documentation License from time to time. Such new versions will be similar in spirit to the present version, but may differ in detail to address new problems or concerns. See http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/. Each version of the License is given a distinguishing version number. If the Document specifies that a particular numbered version of this License "or any later version" applies to it, you have the option of following the terms and conditions either of that specified version or of any later version that has been published (not as a draft) by the Free Software Foundation. If the Document does not specify a version number of this License, you may choose any version ever published (not as a draft) by the Free Software Foundation.

How to use this License for your documents
To use this License in a document you have written, include a copy of the License in the document and put the following copyright and license notices just after the title page: Copyright (c) YEAR YOUR NAME. Permission is granted to copy, distribute and/or modify this document under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.2 or any later version published by the Free Software Foundation; with no Invariant Sections, no Front-Cover Texts, and no Back-Cover Texts. A copy of the license is included in the section entitled "GNU Free Documentation License". If you have Invariant Sections, Front-Cover Texts and Back-Cover Texts, replace the "with...Texts." line with this: with the Invariant Sections being LIST THEIR TITLES, with the Front-Cover Texts being LIST, and with the Back-Cover Texts being LIST. If you have Invariant Sections without Cover Texts, or some other combination of the three, merge those two alternatives to suit the situation. If your document contains nontrivial examples of program code, we recommend releasing these examples in parallel under your choice of free software license, such as the GNU General Public License, to permit their use in free software.